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I Want To Apologize For Hurting You And For Not Appreciating You

Sharmaine Angela Sharmaine Angela | October 7, 2017 | 4 min read

This is my heartfelt apology to you and I hope that you can forgive me.

This is a mistake that I have been making over and over again in my life and I’m desperately trying to correct it before I cause any more damage to our relationship. I have a tendency to be selfish in a relationship. I am selfish in the sense that I am always focusing on what it is that I can bring to the table; I’m always thinking about how I can make the relationship better; I’m too engrossed in the things that I’m doing for you and all of the effort that I put in, I end up failing to notice and appreciate all the things that you’re doing. With everything that I brought into the relationship, I unknowingly put so much pressure on you to match my intensity even when I didn’t want you to. I unknowingly forced you to step up to a level that you weren’t comfortable with going to and that’s completely my fault. I enforced so many of my own expectations on you and on the relationship, I ended up not recognizing the expectations that you had from me and from us. I was too caught up in romanticizing our love for my own pleasure, I completely forgot to pay attention to your needs and your ideals. I have to stop forcing you to become a person you’re not comfortable with being; because YOU’RE the person I fell in love with, not the person that my subconscious wants you to be. I have no right to be mad at you for not being appreciative of my efforts when I constantly fail to do the same for you.

I want to apologize for causing you so much pain. And I want to apologize even more for not noticing it sooner. I want to apologize for pressuring you to turn yourself into this idealized version of a partner that I concocted in my own brain. I had no right to put that kind of pressure on you and you shouldn’t have felt compelled to live up to my unreasonable standards. I want to apologize for telling you that I love you while simultaneously telling you that I wish you would become a better version of yourself. That was hypocritical of me and I need to stop it. I can’t love you for who you are and hope that you change at the same time. I want to apologize for never fully appreciating you for the person that you were; the person that you are. You are more than enough and I am going to always be grateful for you being you. I want to apologize for thinking that I was making it very easy for you to love me when in truth, I made it harder and harder for you every day. I want to apologize for thinking that I was the generous one in the relationship even when I was the one who was always being selfish and deluded. I dreamed too much and I let my dreams blind me from reality, and it ended up hurting the both of us in the end.

This is my heartfelt apology to you and I hope that you can forgive me; or at the very least, understand why things turned out the way that they did. I deeply regret how I acted in this relationship and I only have myself to blame for the wedge that has been driven between us. And despite the fact that a future for us seems dark and unsure, know that I still cling to the hope that you somehow find it in yourself to give us another try. I hope that you can be sure that I now know where I went wrong and I am sincere in my efforts to try to become a better person. I hope that you can believe me when I say that I am willing to do whatever it takes to make things work between us. I hope that you can believe that I am not just saying all of these things out of guilt or out of some selfish agenda. I have no agenda. I just felt like this is something that you needed to hear from me.

And even if things don’t work out for us anymore, that’s fine. I made my bed and I’m going to have to sleep in it. I genuinely wish you a life of happiness whether or not that’s a life with me in it. I genuinely wish that you find the love that I never could give you. I genuinely wish that you get the appreciation that you so desperately needed from me and which I idiotically withheld from you. I hope you eventually find everything that you were looking for, but never managed to find with me. thank you for your unwavering support. It has meant more to me than I can express, even amidst the complications we’ve faced. Your kindness and understanding have been a beacon during our more challenging moments, and I hope you carry that strength into your future.


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Sharmaine Angela
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Sharmaine Angela

Sharmaine is a writer and relationship columnist based in New York. She studied sociology and has spent the last seven years writing about love, identity, and what it actually takes to build something lasting with another person. Her work is sharp, culturally aware, and never afraid to ask the uncomfortable question in the room. Readers come for the insight and stay for the honesty. When she is not at her desk she is at a concert, on a long walk through her neighborhood, or texting her friends paragraphs they did not ask for.